{"id":4049,"date":"2026-10-26T10:27:01","date_gmt":"2026-10-25T23:27:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/diane.eklund.abolins.net\/blog\/?p=4049"},"modified":"2026-10-26T10:27:01","modified_gmt":"2026-10-25T23:27:01","slug":"the-forsyte-saga","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/diane.eklund.abolins.net\/blog\/the-forsyte-saga\/","title":{"rendered":"The Forsyte Saga, John Galsworthy, England"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u2018A Forsyte takes a practical \u2013 one might say a common-sense \u2013 view of things, and a practical view of things is based fundamentally on a sense of property\u2019 (<\/span><\/span>Page <\/span><\/span>131 Heinemann 1976. <\/span><\/span>All quotes are from this edition<\/span><\/span>).<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The Forsyte Saga <\/i><\/span><\/span>comprises three parts or books.<\/span><\/span> <\/i>The Man of Property,<\/i><\/span><\/span> published in 1906.<\/span><\/span> In Chancery, <\/i><\/span><\/span>1920, and the third book<\/span><\/span>, To Let, <\/i><\/span><\/span>1921<\/span><\/span>. <\/i><\/span><\/span>T<\/span><\/span>he entire Forsyte Saga <\/span><\/span>centres on Soames Forsyte, <\/span><\/span>who is a<\/span><\/span> proper, upper-middle-class gentleman of the late nineteenth, <\/span><\/span>early twentieth<\/span><\/span> centur<\/span><\/span>ies<\/span><\/span>. <\/span><\/span>H<\/span><\/span>e regards life through the prism of what he owns; even his wife, the beautiful Irene, is one of his possessions. His emotional development has been hampered by <\/span><\/span>an<\/span><\/span> environment that extols and praises the acquisition of things above all else. He has no time for artists or creative people but he purchases their <\/span><\/span>works of art<\/span><\/span> with a view to making money. He dislikes parting with <\/span><\/span>any of <\/span><\/span>his <\/span><\/span>money, <\/span><\/span>and<\/span><\/span> he wants the best of everything at the lowest possible cost.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"
Galsworthy – A painting by Rudolf Sauter (Source: Britannica)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

When Soames meets Irene he becomes infatuated, <\/span><\/span>even though <\/span><\/span>the feeling is not reciprocated. Finally,<\/span><\/span>\u00a0tiring of his determination after eighteen months of courtship,<\/span><\/span> she <\/span><\/span>reluctantly <\/span><\/span>agrees to marry him, <\/span><\/span>but t<\/span><\/span>he<\/span><\/span> marriage is <\/span><\/span>understandably <\/span><\/span>un<\/span><\/span>happy<\/span><\/span><\/span>. After a couple of years, Soames decides that it would <\/span><\/span>improve<\/span><\/span> his appearance as a successful man, if he had a house in the country, and <\/span><\/span>that the country air<\/span><\/span> might <\/span><\/span>even have a positive effect on his marriage<\/span><\/span>. He appoints an architect called Philip Bosinney who is engaged to be married to <\/span><\/span>J<\/span><\/span>une, a niece of <\/span><\/span>Soames<\/span><\/span>. <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Soames looks down on Bosinney (a common creative) while he aspires to get the best house for the least amount of money. The finished house is perfect, but it doesn\u2019t achieve the goal that Soames has set \u2013 far from it. <\/span><\/span>In fact, Irene discovers in Bosinney the closeness, <\/span><\/span>the love<\/span><\/span> and the humanity she lacks in her relationship with Soames.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"
Late Victorian Fashion (Pinterest)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In Chancery<\/i> begins twelve years after Irene\u2019s affair and its sudden and tragic conclusion. Irene has left her husband and has disappeared, leaving Soames to live the life of a bachelor but without any romantic attachments. Soames never divorced Irene (even though he did have grounds), fearing the impact it would have on his reputation. Then he meets Annette, almost thirty years his junior, and he begins to relish the idea of a son. He soon realises that it is too late to file for divorce on the grounds of his wife being unfaithful more than a decade earlier, but the idea of him putting himself forward as the party at fault is reprehensible to him, and he tries to find another way around the problem.<\/span><\/p>\n

Although Soames is unlikable in many ways, it is difficult not to occasionally feel sorry for him: he is, after all, the product of a family focused only on money, property and reputation, and he knows no better. His cousin Jolyon (an artist) has, however, managed to extricate himself from the family and what it stands for. Perhaps it is interesting to note that while Jolyon makes art, spurred on by an emotional connection with everything around him, Soames collects art focused entirely on its pecuniary worth.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"
Life in England 1904. (Anonymous)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The third book of The Forsyte Saga<\/i>, To Let, <\/i>brings the story of the Forsytes to its foreseeable conclusion. Soames Forsyte is now 65 years old, and the ideal on which Soames has built his life and his relationships \u2013 that is to say the possession of property \u2013 is no longer in fashion. The Great War has upended many ways of thinking: women now have the vote; the ideal is to be doing something<\/i>, not to be doing nothing<\/i>; and a man is no longer judged by what he possesses but more by what he stands for and what he does. As one of the characters observes: \u2018\u2026 the forms of thought change with the times. The pursuit of self-interest is a form of thought that\u2019s going out\u2019 <\/i>and further: \u2018\u2026 that the sense of property is dying out\u2019<\/i> (503).<\/span><\/p>\n

Still and all, changes within society have not yet moved beyond the subtle, and even in the early decades of the twentieth century, Soames can still cling to his nineteenth-century beliefs while cars slowly begin to pollute the air and women start to sense freedoms previously not afforded them.<\/span><\/p>\n

Possession has always been at the centre of Soames\u2019s life, and it is likely that he never understood why Irene did not love him, why she did not want to be viewed as a mere possession, and why she finally left him . But after his cousin Jolyon dies and his sister remarks that he was a very amiable man, Soames begins to suspect that there could be something in the belief that perhaps men are judged by \u2018what they were, <\/i>(rather) <\/i>than by what they did\u2026 \u2018<\/i> (497). At the very end of the book, Galsworthy writes, regarding Soames: He might wish and wish and never get it <\/i>\u2013<\/i> the beauty and the loving in the world.<\/i> (529)<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"
Women’s fashion 1910 (Pinterest)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It is sad that Soames fails to \u2018get it\u2019, with the result that his life is just one long disappointment. When Irene looks for love elsewhere, Soames is confounded \u2013 after all, he had given her everything. Everything but what she really wanted. Jolyon, on the other hand, understands beauty and love in a way that eludes Soames. Perhaps the only thing that Soames and Jolyon could finally agree upon (from two very different perspectives) was the impossibility of a relationship between their own children.<\/span><\/p>\n

T<\/span><\/span>he writing <\/span><\/span>is <\/span><\/span>at all times<\/span><\/span> beautiful, displaying a delightful sense of humour and an ironic understanding of England\u2019s upper-middle class <\/span><\/span>during the Victorian and Edwardian periods <\/span><\/span>while<\/span><\/span> the attention to detail is to be a<\/span><\/span>dmired<\/span><\/span>. <\/span><\/span>In the third and final book<\/span><\/span>,<\/i><\/span><\/span> Galsworthy <\/span><\/span>paints<\/span><\/span> a thought-provoking picture of England after the First World War as society finally begins to <\/span><\/span>turn its gaze upon itself<\/span><\/span>, and the old set-in-stone beliefs around class, money and possessions are <\/span><\/span>re-evaluated<\/span><\/span>. One hundred years on society is still, <\/span><\/span>to <\/span><\/span>a large<\/span><\/span> extent, <\/span><\/span>focused on the acquisition of property as determining one\u2019s place in society, but <\/span><\/span>we can only hope that<\/span><\/span> women have a slightly better, and more independent, standing than their sisters all those years ago.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u2018A Forsyte takes a practical \u2013 one might say a common-sense \u2013 view of things, and a practical view of things is based fundamentally on a sense of property\u2019 (Page 131 Heinemann 1976. All quotes are from this edition). The Forsyte Saga comprises three parts or books. The Man of Property, published in 1906. In … <\/p>\n

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